


Foss in therapy, part 7

by belmanoir



Series: Foss in therapy [7]
Category: Kyle XY
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-01
Updated: 2012-04-01
Packaged: 2017-11-02 21:08:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/373363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/belmanoir/pseuds/belmanoir





	Foss in therapy, part 7

Next time he has to do it again, tell her something that made him happy and something that made him sad or angry. He thinks about it compulsively all week. _How does this make me feel?_ he starts asking himself every time he does anything, trying to find something he doesn't mind her knowing about. He wonders if maybe that's the real point. That makes him feel angry. Angry and manipulated. He's on edge. He snaps at Kyle in training. On Thursday he still doesn't have anything he's willing to tell her, and then he loses it in the supermarket and shouts at the cashier.

This isn't working. Nicole was wrong, he can't do this. He can't afford to do this. He pulls out his phone and punches in her cell number. 

"Mr. Foss?" she answers the phone. She still calls him Mr. Foss. It's ridiculous but somehow he can't ever make himself say _Call me Tom._

"Something's come up. I can't make it today."

"Is everything all right?"

"Everything's fine," he says, trying to keep the edge out of his voice. "I just can't make it."

"Okay. When would you like to reschedule for? Tomorrow I'm busy, but I could meet you somewhere this weekend if you'd like."

"I can't do it this week."

There's a pause. His heart pounds. "All right," she says. "I'll see you next Thursday, then?"

"I'll have to see."

"Are you sure everything's all right?"

"Yes."

"In that case, I'd like you to make time for our appointment."

"I'll have to see," he repeats. He's never going back there again.

"Mr. Foss, we had an agreement."

And here it is. The kids' training. "You know I wouldn't let the kids get hurt."

He can hear her sigh. "I know you wouldn't let the kids get hurt if you could help it."

He squeezes his eyes shut. "I have to go."

"Mr. Foss--"

He hangs up. Now there's nothing to do but wait and see if the kids show up for training. If they don't, he'll have to think of something. Some other way to appease her. 

###

Twenty minutes later, he's doing a safety check of the climbing wall and he hears someone banging on the door. He's not expecting anyone, but Declan likes to show up unexpectedly sometimes. Tom isn't too worried. He checks that his gun is in his waistband, just in case, and walks the perimeter of the room to the window that gives him an only partially obstructed view of the door. Nicole is standing there in her little brown jacket and tasteful hippie jewelry, her mouth a tight line.

Tom grits his teeth. Has Kyle told _everyone_ the location of the warehouse? He gets down and heads to where he's out of the line of sight of any of the windows. She'll go away when he doesn't answer the door. 

Five minutes later, she's still there and still banging on the door at regular intervals. "Mr. Foss," she yells. "I'm not going away until you talk to me!"

Kyle and Jessi are coming at four. If she's still here when they get there--he swallows his panic and gets up, furious that she's winning another round. She starts banging again. "Hold your horses!" he calls. "I'm coming." He opens the door. She looks him over. He wonders if she's trying to figure out if he's been drinking, and that just makes him madder. She looks so puzzled and concerned and sad, and he just--he wants her to leave.

"I don't understand. I thought last week's session went well. Did something happen that I didn't--"

"Nothing happened. I just can't do this."

"Why not?" she demands. 

He breathes out hard through his nose. He has to tell her. He has to tell her something or she'll never leave him alone. "Look, all the reasons you wanted me to do this in the first place--the irritability, the possible erratic behavior--talking to you is just making it worse."

"Worse how?"

"I can't--I lost my temper at some wage slave this morning. I'm not in control, and I have to be."

She sighs and chews her lower lip. Then she says, "You weren't in control before."

"Wh--what?"

"Why did you take Kyle and Declan to Madacorp?"

His stomach starts to buzz. "To get Kyle's ring."

"Why did Kyle need the ring?"

"Baylin gave it to him. It had important information concealed inside it."

"What important information?"

He waves an arm. "Well--Baylin's location, for one thing." 

"You knew where Baylin was."

He glares at her, trapped.

"It could have been Kyle in that chair." 

He has to admire her ruthlessness. "Yeah, well it wasn't."

"Do you think that was a good decision?"

It was one of the most unforgivably stupid things he's ever done, which is saying something. "Hindsight is 20/20."

"Do you think it was a _logical_ decision?" she asks calmly. "You loved Kyle and Baylin and so you risked your own life and the lives of two children on a suicidally stupid mission. You weren't thinking straight."

So this is what she's been thinking all along. That he's a fool, that he's dangerous, that he can't be trusted. Beneath his anger and nervous tension is a sick humiliation, and at the same time a sick sense of comfort that she sees him for who he really is after all. He blinks hard.

"Do you remember when Kyle was first learning to use his powers?" she asks gently.

Kyle and Baylin standing at that window with that round glass of water. The smell of the plants and the calm. The incompetent sniper broke the goblet. For a moment Tom wants it to be whole again so badly he can't believe it. His eyes sting.

"Do you remember how he used to break things?"

Tom glances up at the roof, involuntarily. Nicole follows his gaze. "He broke that skylight?"

He nods.

She frowns. "While you were standing under it?"

He shrugs. "It didn't hurt us."

"Do you think that means it isn't safe for Kyle to use his powers?"

Suddenly he sees where she's going with this. "It's not the same."

She smiles at him. "It's exactly the same. You have the power to feel happy, and sad, and angry, and you have the power to make other people feel those things too. And it's safer to learn to control those powers than it is to ignore them. Safer for you, and safer for service workers."

_I was fine before,_ he thinks, but there's no point lying when Nicole won't pretend to believe him. "What's that got to do with Madacorp?" he says instead. Not because he doesn't see the connection, but because he can't--he wants--he's desperate for some indication that "suicidally stupid" isn't all she thinks of him. He's hooked like a fish on a line.

She chews at the corner of her mouth for a few seconds. "Using good judgment means being able to assess the potential risks and benefits of a course of action," she says finally. "If you can't acknowledge your own biases, you can't do that." She sighs. "I'm sorry I was harsh. I chose Madacorp because I knew you'd care about the danger to the kids. But in the end, the only person you hurt was yourself. I hope...I don't want..." She trails off.

"Yeah?"

She looks him in the eye. "I like you, Mr. Foss. I hope that someday you'll care whether or not you hurt yourself."

His eyes are stinging again. He ducks his head, feeling obscurely ashamed.

"Will you come to your session?"

He nods once, quickly. He doesn't look at her expression.

"Wonderful. I'll give you a ride." He guesses she doesn't want him to escape.

"I can drive."

"It's no trouble. I have to go to Ikea later anyway to buy a new bookshelf for Kyle. Dropping you off here will be right on my way."

He looks up. "You can't fit a bookshelf in that car." After her accident last year, she bought an even tinier hybrid.

She smiles ruefully. "No, I'll have to pay to have it delivered."

It's a waste of money. "I can drive you. We can swing by here on the way back to get your car."

She gives him a narrow-eyed look. He doesn't blame her for being confused. But he just meets her eyes blankly and after a few seconds the lure of not having to pay extra to have some teenager drive eight pieces of chipboard twenty miles is too great for her. "Thank you," she says. "That would be a real help."


End file.
